Avatar:Home Again

"Yun [...] You're not going anywhere."

— Kyoshi to Yun as they prepare to fight.

Template:Chapter infobox"Home Again" is the twenty-sixth chapter of The Shadow of Kyoshi.

Overview

Kyoshi returns to Yokoya for the first time in months, only to find both the land and her past steeped in decay and regret. There, she confronts Yun at the Avatar mansion for the last time, engaging him in a brutal battle. Aided by her allies, she heroically fights to contain his destruction and end his murderous rampage. When the tide of battle turns against her, Kyoshi resorts to trickery in a final, desperate act where she wields both power and mercy to bring a tragic end to her friend's life and to save her lover.

Synopsis

A month after Zoryu's "victory", Kyoshi walks through Yokoya, noting that Jianzhu's death and the death of the other sages took its toll on the place. Her uneasiness confirms to her that she had been wrong when she cut ties with it after Kelsang's murder, as only home could make her feel this bad. She notices logs pounded into the earth to appease the spirits, and muses that spirits are as complex and varied as humans. Children scamper, and eye her as a stranger from covers, not recognizing Kyoshi, who is not wearing her makeup. Kyoshi is relieved not to run into Aoma or anyone she who would recognize her, realizing it is midday, and they would be working, while she had stepped off a pleasure draft owned by Fire Nation royalty. She arrives at the Avatar mansion, now in a state of neglect, stressing how much work was needed to upkeep such a large estate. Opening the gates, Kyoshi notes how the different parts of the garden died and flourished unattended, and finds a message, "I'm inside", written in pebbles, waiting for her.

Though not one greets her, she enters, and checks different sections until she finds Yun at the head of a table in the dining room. He is eating dumplings, attended by Auntie Mui, who has tears in her eyes. Kyoshi wants to separate her from Yun, but before she can do anything, Mui hugged her in joy, ignorant of the danger. She says Kyoshi and Yun were the heart of the place, and that they will have guests again, wishing for things to be the way they were before. The situation reminds Kyoshi of the garden party. Never losing sight of Yun, Kyoshi agrees with Mui, earning a mocking smirk from him. Yun suggests they have a big dinner to welcome Kyoshi home, and Kyoshi requests Stalknose mushrooms, something Mui will not be able to find while shopping, that will keep here away from the mansion for a longer while until she realizes it.

After giving Mui enough time to leave the mansion, Yun reveals Mui gave the staff the day off, so the house should be empty. He finishes the dumplings and asks about her recent endeavors, wondering if she has mastered the Avatar State or some other secret technique to fight him. Kyoshi informs him she has learned healing, and that has teacher says she is the fastest study she has ever had. Yun jokingly asks if she would check the shoulder Hei-Ran injured. She is clear in her intent to put him away. Continuing, she explains he cannot be seen in public again, as this would unravel the solution Zoryu came up with, which would throw the Fire Nation into chaos. Yun does not care anymore, and is glad not to have to either, having had enough of negotiating, accommodating, and bending over backwards for others' benefits. In the weeks recovering from his injuries, he has thought of all the liars and backstabbers who kissed his feet as the Avatar, and realized he knows enough about them to actually kill them all if he puts time into it. Kyoshi sees there is no hope for a quiet, peaceful solution, and that Yun considers the entire world to have wronged him. She tells him he is not going anywhere, and he asks if she will throw him in a cage, like Jianzhu did with Xu Ping An, telling her he does not want to fight her, and that she is not leaving him much of a choice. That is actions are of his own free will, and not Father Glowworm controlling him hurts as much as Kuruk said it would. Kyoshi draws her fans, declaring she did not say he had a choice.

Yun rises from his chair, and makes the first move, flicking his elbow and causing a stone column to burst through the floor, overturning the table, and reaching the ceiling before stopping. He provided them both with ammunition. Both begin punching bullets from it, aiming blind, Yun better at spiraling airbending footwork to avoid them. Kyoshi sends the entire column at him, tears the house open until it goes outside, revealing the sky and the fields. She clears the dust with airbending, finding Yun no longer there. She takes the exit that leads to the central part of the house, with more rooms and corridors, finding its many options to be a battleground more of Yun's liking. A spike bursts through a painting, aimed at her hand, which she blunts with brute strength, grinding it to dust a feet from her face by holding out her fan. Yun comments on her strength, and she follows his voice. Turning a corner, a wall of bricks closes itself in front of her, blocking her way to Yun's room, while from the opposite direction, he comments he never liked her going into his room. Kyoshi responds she never did, to his gratitude, and throws an airbending kick behind her at his approaching voice. She only looks after hearing the paper screens and hallway tables crash against the wall on the other end, Yun still not in sight, but still within earshot to comment on her finally using another element.

Kyoshi moves toward the back into the derelict training grounds, rotting stray dummies and shattered clay disks bleached white. She tells him that whether he kills her or not, he has to let go of what happened. Yun emerges from an alcove, livid, pointing out her hypocrisy after her aid in killing Jianzhu. She points out that doing so did not bring her any peace, and concedes that the lies and what Jianzhu did do him was wrong, but has to live with his anger instead of putting it on others. Kyoshi says he does not deserve to hurt her or anyone else over his suffering. He pauses for a moment, causing her to believe for a moment she succeeded, but he merely tells her she got it wrong. With a move that reminded her of Tagaka's waterbending, Yun liquefies the stone floor without heat behind her and tightly encases her in it, leaving her unable to even move her head. For a moment, Kyoshi believes Yun is a waterbender before realizing what happened. He begins disarming her of her fans, explaining he would never harm her, as the one innocent party in the entire affair. He recalls how Jianzhu had compared to duty to the four nations to unruly children in need of a strong hand. Yun believed it meant guiding by example, but now thinks it means giving it a few slaps until it stops throwing a tantrum. He disapproves of the scars and armors, blaming Avatarhood for turning her into a terror, for how it has made her treat him. With pride, Kyoshi says loudly she wears those clothes because she chose to, and that she has truer friends than him.

Yun leaps back, dodging Kirima's water whip at the last second, and another one, creating further distance between them. At Kirima's command, Wong approaches dust-stepping and weakening Kyoshi's encasing enough for her to break free and almost grapple Yun. He skates away, moving the earth instead of his legs. He blocks Kirima's attacks with a slab before sending it at her, which he narrowly avoids. He compliments the technique, as he could not tell their approach with their feet off the ground, and asks if Rangi is with them. The air above him shimmers for a moment before he glances up and rolls out of the way of Rangi's flaming fist, which leaves a smoking whole in the ground. Jinpa circles above on Yingyong, where Rangi leapt from. After leaving the Fire Nation, Kyoshi had informed Jinpa of secret hideouts and codes, and had him memorize the daofei oath parts involving defending their sworn sisters. She also gave him a lot of Jianzhu's gold to bribe them. Lao Ge was not present, but with the rest of the Flying Opera Company at her back, her confidence soars.

Yun derisively asks if these are the scum daofei who she is calling her companions. Kirima jokes they do not socialize enough to be considered companions. She sends a torrent at Yun, able to land a hit because Wong's own attack moves his raised shield aside. Kyoshi attempts to imitate Yun's move against the Fire Nation court and sink his limbs into the ground, but he pulls himself free easily, claiming the earth his his elements, merely letting others borrow it. Wong drops a giant plane of tiles above him, but Yun merely flicks his shoulders, causing it to shatter and fall neatly around him. He suggests they try something else, Rangi taking it up his offer, leaving herself open and charging up an attack with three deep, slow breaths. She releases her attack, so intense the flames almost turn from yellow to white. Rather than blocking the blasts, Yun dodges, riding a swell of earth, Rangi hunting him down for nearly killing her mother, the fire leaving the walls blackened. Yun hops off the stone when Rangi's attack dies down, him and everyone else but Rangi surprised by its ferocity. Noting that she is playing for keeps, Yun decides to do so as well, taking a deep, fundamental stance, something Kyoshi had never seen him do, which frightens her. Kyoshi and Rangi are thrown off their feet as Yun liquefies the foundations of the mansion, borrowing from Jianzhu's style to demolish instead of building. The walls begin to collapse, as if the mansion had been built on quicksand rather than bedrock. Kirima and Wong also lose their balance and tumble off the roof into the courtyard, their mist and dust-stepping requiring a firm base to work.

Acting on Kyoshi's previous instructions to keep himself off the fight and offer rescue when needed, Jinpa moves in to pick whoever he could to safety. Yun raises a hedge of stone spears, Kyoshi recalling in fear the image of Kelsang gliding over the iceberg. Jinpa rolls Yingyong around so his saddle could act as armor, but leaves himself exposed. One spear takes a bit of fur off the bison's tail, two pierce the wooden platform, and the fourth runs through Jinpa's shoulder, pinning him to the saddle horn. The bison roars and pulls our of the dive, drifting so Kyoshi could see his rider. Jinpa's shock dissolved into calmness while looking at the injury, and Yingyong flees away from the battle. Screaming over the sound of the ground and the house collapsing, Yun tells Kyoshi it was a mistake to bring others. Wong and Kirima attempt to get into Yun's blindside, having timed their steps against the ground's spasms. Yun continues, telling Kyoshi she let herself vulnerable. Now able to track their movements on the ground, Yun creates cracks under Kirima and Wong, swallowing them up to their knees, their own momentum breaking their legs. They scream for a moment before clamping their mouths shut in an attempt to deny him their pain.

Yun focuses his earthbending under Rangi and Kyoshi, not letting them stand, forcing them to stay in all fours, bowed to him. From a corner, Yun sends earthen training disks at them, aiming at their shoulders, stomach, and back. The final disks hit them over their jaws, leaving them on their backs, choking on the disk's dust. Rangi tells Kyoshi she has to do what she tried to teach her since the raid on Governor Te's palace. Kyoshi says she's able to do it, but not for long. Yun allows them to stand again, and seeing themselves covered in white dust, they use their blood to draw their daofei faces on.

Yun recognizes Kyoshi's face as the one she showed Jianzhu back at Qinchao Village, Kyoshi retorting she's now showing it to him. Before he could do anything, Kyoshi jet-stepped towards him, also using her hands for extra propulsion and stability. Yun sent another wave to knock her off balance in surprise, but to no avail, as jet-stepping specifically did not require solid ground to balance on. Kyoshi rams into his stomach with her shoulder, sending him rolling over the yard until he shifts to ground to halt his skid. He covers himself with another shield to protect himself from Rangi, who sends fire while hovering above him. Aware even Rangi could not stay afloat with jet-stepping indefinitely, Kyoshi aimed a massive fireball at Yun, but it missed. Still afloat, Rangi made a waterbender-like motion, redirecting Kyoshi's attack back at Yun. His last-second shield was not as thick as it needed to be and burst upon impact. When the smoke cleared, Yun was not in sight, only a patch of loose earth. As Rangi shouted of Yun's tunneling, he rose on a mound of earth like a waterspout, stabbing her back with an earth spike just as had with Hei-Ran.

Her flames sputtered out and she fell to the ground, Kyoshi catching her and felling the wet blood on her back. She shut her eyes and fought entering the Avatar State, finding no comfort in its offer of power and victory, only pain and sorrow. Kyoshi fears that if Rangi dies, she would no longer be Kyoshi herself. Rangi calls out to her and reaches for her face, asking Kyoshi to stay with her, her hand dropping before touching Kyoshi as she falls unconscious. Yun lets the spike crumble, telling her it did not need to be this way, but it will be if she keeps trying to stop him. Kyoshi thinks back to Kuruk nearly letting her destroy her surroundings in the Spirit World, and the Yun's own damage there. Knowing what Yun wanted to hear, despite his claim of her innocence, she apologizes for stealing his Avatarhood. She spoke low, so he approached as she continued to apologize for stealing his future. He knells beside her to take in her confession, and she wants him close. He asks what else she is sorry for, and suggests what she told him earlier as an option. Kyoshi apologizes for telling him to live with his pain, putting her hand on his chest, adding that he will not, and sends a powerful cold through him, instantly freezing his heart and lungs, weaponizing Atuat's healing technique. Yun falls to the side dead, and Kyoshi turns to Rangi, desperate for water. Pleading to her past lives, Kuruk no longer blocking the way, she is able to summon water from the well that supplied the mansion, cracking the ground open on the way. The water coats the same hand that killed Yun, and starts to heal Rangi.

Later, Rangi wakes up in the infirmary, one of the few parts of the mansion still standing. Kyoshi explains she has been working on her since stabilizing her and bringing her there, Kirima complaining she left her and Wong to suffer all the while, their legs in splints. She is appalled Kyoshi did not even give them anything for the pain, Kyoshi rebuking her, claiming Jinpa needed the medicine more. Jinpa is swaddled in bandages, slightly altered over the pain medication, drawing patterns in the air and singing tavern songs monks should not know. Wong supports Kimira's complaint, as Jinpa is not a sworn member. Kyoshi shuts down their complaints, informing them Atuat is on her way and can treat them better than she can. Kyoshi lists off to Rangi the potential complications of her injuries, her training under Atuat giving her more knowledge on the skills she lacked than the skills proper. Rangi is not concerned, but Kyoshi is, having determined Yun's stab narrowly missed her lung. Kyoshi adds that Hei-Ran is on her way as well. Rangi asks if it is over, and Kyoshi confirms Yun is dead, the others growing silent. Rangi and Kyoshi both cry over Yun.

Production notes

Series continuity

• Kyoshi reaffirms her ties to Yokoya despite vowing in "The Inheritance" to never call the place her home again.
• Kyoshi accepts that Yun will not let go of his pain and anger, giving up on her belief from "Desperate Measures" that he could not hold a grudge.
• Rangi's choice of drawing for her Flying Opera Company makeup is a mark from the Painted Lady.
• Kyoshi uses waterbending to freeze Yun's heart and lungs, a healing technique foreshadowed in "Aftermath" when Atuat warns that lowering one's body temperature too much will turn the person's fluids to ice and destroy the organs from the inside out.

Trivia

• Out of all the elements, Kyoshi overlooked waterbending the most.